News

The Chapin School Veterans Housing project, a partnership of O’Connell Development Group and Soldier On, a not-for-profit group dedicated to providing housing for homeless veterans, converted a 120-year-old building from a vacant elementary school to a 43-unit apartment building for homeless veterans. All the units are one bedroom and come fully furnished. Construction was completed in late summer and the first 20 residents have moved in over the past two weeks. The building should be fully occupied in the next few weeks. ODG earned a fee as the developer of the building and Western Builders renovated the building. Appleton Corporation provided Management Oversight Services for the lease-up. The $7.3 million rehabilitation was funded from a variety of different sources including affordable housing grants, low income housing tax credits, historic tax credits, and City of Chicopee loan. The complex is set up as a limited equity housing cooperative which means the residents own their unit as a member of the building cooperative. In order to qualify to live in the building a resident must be a veteran and earn no more than the federal low-income requirements of about $29,000 a year. Each resident first pays $2,500 for a share in the cooperative, and then pays a monthly rent that is 30 percent of their income.